The popularity of surfing as a sports and recreation activity has prompted surfboard fabricators to create several surfboard designs and to develop various methods of surfboard construction. While the particulars of surfboard construction are varied to some extent and ar generally a matter of design choice, all surfboards generally comprise a substantially planar, elongated buoyant board having a generally pointed front portion and a tapered rear portion. In most constructions the surfboard edges are rounded to achieve optimum fluid motion characteristics. In recent years, the surfboard constructions have generally been divided on the basis of surfboard lengths. The so called long boards are typically seven or eight feet in length while the newer short boards are approximately five feet in length. The emergence of short boards results in increased maneuverability on the part of the user and is achievable primarily due to the exceedingly buoyant yet strong construction afforded by the recently developed foam core type surfboards.
Unlike the long board construction in which the board is formed of a solid wood construction, the short boards comprise a light weight plastic foam material shaped to conform to the desired surfboard configuration. To achieve the required strength, the surfboard is "glassed" by covering the foam core with multiple layers of fiberglass cloth laminated with a laminating resin to produce a smooth, durable outer finish. The laminated fiberglass provides a waterproof seal for the foam core and substantially increases the strength and weight supporting ability of the surfboard.
To provide the desired characteristics of the surfboard, a plurality of downwardly extending fins, generally three, are attached to the rear underside of the surfboard.
In the typical foam core surfboard construction, the foam core is initially formed and shaped to the desired surfboard configuration. Thereafter, a layer of fiberglass cloth is fitted to the surfboard's bottom surface and a laminating resin is applied in sufficient quantity to saturate the entire fiberglass cloth and underlying foam surface. The excess resin and any accumulated air bubbles are removed by a squeegee process. The fiberglass cloth is then wrapped around the edge portions of the surfboard foam core and a second layer of fiberglass cloth is laminated to the other surface of the surfboard in a similar process. Once the resin has cured, the process of fin installation is carried forward.
A plurality of hand made fiberglass fins are positioned on the underside of the surfboard and glued in place with a suitable resin mixture. After the initial fin glue has cured, fiberglass cloth patches are layered along the junction of the surfboard surface and the sides of the attached fins. The fiberglass cloth is then saturated with resin and smoothed to remove bubbles and excess resin. As a result, a fillet contoured to the junction of the surfboard and fin is produced which strengthens the attachment of the surfboard. The next step is to remove the excess fiberglass from the fins and the adjacent portions of the surfboard and allow the resin to cure. Next, a coat of sanding resin is applied to the surfaces of the surfboard and allowed to cure completely. Thereafter, the surfboard is sanded by progressively finer grit sanding materials to produce a clean, smooth surface. It has been determined that approximately one-third of the entire sanding time required for a surfboard is spent addressing the fin area and surrounding board surfaces. Once sanding is complete, a finished coat of resin is applied and cured to produce a high-gloss resin finish. As a final step, the finish resin is sanded with progressively finer sand grits and eventually buffed to a high lustre. The problems of properly sanding and polishing the fin area continue to occupy a major portion of the time expended on the sanding process.
In addition to the inordinate sanding time required to fabricate the conventional finned surfboard, a safety hazard is presented in that the fins tend to cut the finishers hand when it slips during the sanding operation. In addition, the fins often interfere with and grab the buffing wheel used in the final buffing process. These problems associated with the foregoing manufacture of finned surfboards have prompted practitioners in the surfboard fabricating art to create structures which permit the fins to be secured to attachments within the surfboard by various clamp and fastener constructions. One such structure is set forth in U.S. Pat. No. 3,564,632. To date however, such fin holders have been subject to disadvantages of increased weight and have exhibited poor mounting strength and are not therefore, found generally acceptable by surfboard manufacturers.
There arises therefore, a need in the art for a simpler and more economical method of surfboard fabrication which overcomes the difficulties of attaching and securing the fins to the underside of foam core surfboards.